How to Drink Natural Wine Like Someone Who Knows What They're Doing

Seriously talking about wine without sounding like the worst person ever is a very delicate dance; the risk heightens even further when you delve into the world of natural wine. Luckily we have comedian slash actor slash vintner Eric Wareheim, whose new line of wines is actually quite good, and who will quickly remind you that wine is meant to be fun. (It’s also meant to be drunk.) Wareheim manages to wax poetic on natural wine and winemaking without sounding pretentious, so we asked him to break down the basics of the topic for the fledgling enthusiasts among us. Over some pizza slices in Los Angeles, the Las Jaras Wines producer gave us a no-bullshit beginner’s guide to the trendy new (yet very old) world of natural wine.

Natural wine means a lot of things

Natural wine is an umbrella term that can refer to a number of kinds of wine. (This is where things can get confusing.) Natural wine is generally “organic”, although not always USDA-certified organic, and not all organic wine is natural wine. Biodynamic is also organic and chemical-free but follows another book of rules that sets it apart. Essentially, natural wine is made super simply with low intervention. No chemicals, and as few additives (if any) as possible. “Low-intervention means, How do we make this wine like they did 2,000 years ago? Which is you don't fuck with it,” Wareheim says. "You use the native yeast that's on the berries, you don't add any kind of outside yeasts or stimulants or anything. Try to keep it as clean as possible.”

With natural wine, you know what you’re getting

Because natural wine is made by little guys versus corporate wine giants, there tends to be more transparency between winemaker and consumer. “When you go to your organic farmer's market, you go there for a reason: because everything's gonna taste good,” Wareheim says. "You know what farm it's from and there are no chemicals in it. It’s the same with natural winemakers.” You, the newly minted connoisseur, can go to a natural winemaker’s website and find out exactly what goes down from the vine to the bottle, which is not the norm.“With a lot of big commercial wines, you don't have to list the ingredients in the back so they're putting all kinds of weird toxic preservatives, coloring agents, sweeteners,” Wareheim says. A lot of what you get at your local shop or big-box store includes these additives, all of which are both sketchy and hangover-inducing.

Natural wines are as crushable as they come

There’s a reason you’ll see Wareheim chugging natural wine in the sea, in the pool, on the back of an ATV on his Instagram account. It’s promotional, yes, but it’s more of a testament to how light and easy natural wine is to drink. “When I started drinking wines with low sulfites, you just feel better. You feel a lot higher too. You're elevated, versus wanting to take a nap,” Wareheim says. “A big, old, shitty, commercial Chianti—I'm done after one glass.” Natural wines are so energizing that they’re safe for drinking before a big night out. Wareheim took some on the road to Las Vegas for a bachelor party, starting the night with some Pét-Nat (a naturally effervescent, super-light style of natural wine that will put any 10-dollar bottle of Prosecco to shame) and cabernet before transitioning to rounds of shots.

Pét-Nat is like Champagne without the headache

Speaking of Pét-Nat, we should probably define that. Pétillant Naturel is a sparkling wine that’s made by throwing still-fermenting wine into a bottle and letting nature take its course. “It's kind of a gamble wine. You don't know exactly how it's gonna turn out,” says Wareheim. Pét-Nat gets its bubbles from the fermentation that goes on inside the bottle, so it’s more lightly effervescent than a bottle of Veuve. Because there are fewer sugars and chemicals in Pét-Nat than other traditional sparkling wines, you’re less likely to get a raging headache or hangover from drinking the stuff.

Natural wine pairs very, very well with food

Learning about natural wine is all about experimentation, because of the variety you’ll find even within a type of grape from a specific region. So go nuts with your pairing attempts, and go with confidence. Natural wines aren’t always as in-your-face as traditional wines can be—most natural wines are meant to be drunk young, a few years after bottling, and don’t have the weight and tannins of an old-ass wine—so they’re much easier to pair with food. “I feel like it's big part of the [current] restaurant scene, having these kind of wines that pair really good with food,” says Wareheim, who goes for charbono for pizza, rosé with vegetables, and Pét-Nat with oysters (or fried chicken).

To find the right bottle, ask a professional

Wareheim has one simple tip for finding the right wine: get to know your local wine shop owner. “The first thing is you go to your shop and ask for the owner,” Wareheim says. That doesn’t mean the sales guy working the floor. The owner. “If you’re in L.A., you go to Lou (Lou Wine Shop) or Jill (Domaine LA) and you tell 'em, ‘I am doing this thing, I'm eating pasta tonight, I'm going on a date, I'm going to the beach’ and they'll guide you to what you want.” Once you start establishing a rapport with the shopkeeper, they’ll start to remember your preferences, and build on your experiences to suggest wines perfectly fit to your palate.